Classical philosophy and Darwinian biology are far more compatible than is usually assumed. In fact, looking at either from the standpoint of the other can enrich and deepen our appreciation of both. From a Darwinian point of view, the theories of Plato and Aristotle deserve to be taken very seriously. From the classical point of view, Darwinian biology is much less reductionist than its enemies suppose.

Wednesday, June 8, 2016

A defense of Aristotle

A response to my last entry was
posted at the International Political Science Association Research Committee
#12 Facebook page.

As you implied, the quote from Aristotle of man, in the role
of husband and father, as a ruler of a household opens the discussion to
controversy. Your first paper did not do this. Plato's views on women are less
offensive to those whose social and political views are more gender egalitarian
even though his political model is subject to criticism for other reasons.

This is a fair criticism and it
comes from a friend and frequent interlocutor.
I reply that it is a sign of the immaturity of our academic culture that
we need to be afraid of controversy. Controversy
ought to invite reasoned even if spirited conversation. Instead, today, it frequently results in accusations
and scarlet letters.

I will offer here a reasonable
defense of Aristotle for reasonable readers.
Aristotle got a lot of things wrong.
His physics (in the modern sense) is largely useless. He thought that the function of the brain was
to cool the blood. He thought that the
female provided only the matter for her offspring while the father provided all
the formal elements. He states that the
father has natural authority over the mother and her children, and he provides
what certainly looks like a defense of slavery.

On the other hand, he got a lot
more right. His biology is astonishingly
close to contemporary theory, as I have argued in many previous posts and will
defend in this one. Even his mistakes lend
support to what we know see as the correct view.

Consider his defense of slavery
in Book 1 of the Politics. To understand the context of that argument,
one must know that Aristotle distinguished three types of rule: political,
royal, and despotic. The second type of
rule may be best understood as a special case of the first. Both political and royal rule are exercised
for the sake of the governed and only accidently for the sake of the
governor. For example, the father
provides for the family and decides how the provisions will be used; however,
he benefits from these decisions only in so far as he is one more member of the
family. His superior authority does not
entitle him to a greater share.

Aristotle recognizes a range of
political animals and only says that human beings are the most political
animals. He tells us in the History of Animals, Book 1, that
politics animals are those that engage in some one and common work. This means that such animals cooperate in
ways that benefit the community of cooperators.
As David Depew argues (rightly, in my view) Aristotle was less interested
in sorting animals into kinds that in understanding the traits that distinguish kinds of animals.

He thought that the traits were
intelligible by their function in their natural contexts. Animals live and move through three great
natural realms. Some swim, some walk, some
fly, and some (like seals) move between these realms. These are what we now call environmental
niches. In the niches in which they operate,
their traits are largely determine by how each creature gets its food. This is, obviously, and adaptationist
approach. Bears hunt alone. Elk need not cooperate much to eat grass;
however, wolves must cooperate to eat elk.
In all or almost all cases, cooperation requires a division of
labor. When chimpanzees hunt monkeys,
the hunters must adopt one of three distinct roles. Obviously I am not limiting myself to
Aristotle’s examples, but that makes my point.
Aristotle got a lot right.

The relationship between the
members of a group of political animals must involve justice. While the “citizens” of a chimpanzee hunting
party must subordinate themselves to the whole by accepting their roles, each
must also expect to benefit. By
contrast, the relationship between the predators and prey is ruthless
exploitative.

In this context, we can
understand Aristotle’s analysis of despotic rule. When one human being takes command of
another, and not at all for the other’s sake but purely for self-interest, this
is despotic rule. When is slavery
just? He is very clear. If one human being differs from another to
the same degree that a man differs from an animal or the soul differs from the
body, the superior person may with justice enslave and exploit the inferior
person. He notes that many Greeks are
comfortable with enslaving barbarians but uncomfortable with enslaving other
Greeks. This indicates that they
understand, more or less dimly, his distinction.

That is the condensed version of
Aristotle’s defense of slavery. The
problem is that it doesn’t justify any actual instances slavery for the simple
reason that no two human beings stand in the relationship that Aristotle
describes. If anthropos is the political animal, then all anthropoi are capable of participation in political life and
cannot, therefore, be justly enslaved.
Both Plato and Aristotle interpret Homer’s Cyclopes as a version of a
primitive, isolated, and violent stage of human life. Both understand this case as the result of
some apocalyptic destruction of civilization or, perhaps, the condition out of
which civilization first emerged.
Circumstances, not nature, make a Cyclopes.

Aristotle made of a defense of
slavery that is, according to his own reasoning, a condemnation of all
slavery. Was he aware of this? I think so.
But then I am in love with Aristotle and you probably should be wary of
anything I say about him.

I cannot so thoroughly acquit Aristotle
of political incorrect views with regard to his account of the natural
structure of the family. He clearly thinks
that the father is the natural ruler of the family, with authority over both
his wife and his children. It won’t do
to point out that his view is in consonance with most human cultures both in
his own time, in the times between, and today.
Whether the world is round or flat doesn’t depend on how many people
think the one or the other. As another
friend and frequently interlocutor put it at the same location:

I like to revise Aristotle’s views of FRIENDSHIP between
husbands and wives based on female access to education. Husbands and wives are
TRUE FRIENDS.

I concur. The natural flowering of the marital
relationship requires equality. I would
point out, however, how little needs to be adjusted to bring Aristotle’s view
in accord with this.

In the Politics he argues that it is barbaric for a man to treat his wife
the same way as he treats his slave.
This is true for two reasons. One
is that the slave is a beast of burden, exploited for the sake of the master
and not all for the sake of the beast.
Whereas the slave is chattel, the wife is a member of the family and the
responsibility of the father is to serve the family and not vice versa.

The other is that the
relationship between the father and mother is political rather than royal. A parent commands his children as a king
commands his subjects. Any parent who
has ever said “because I say so” understands the point. In Aristotle’s view, the father and mother
are partners in the governance of the family.
They both want the same thing, for the family to flourish; in accord
with this aim, their relationship must be based on persuasion and consent. The only difference between the marital
relationship and a genuinely political relationship is that in the latter, the
citizens are equal and rule or are ruled by turns. In Aristotle’s family, the
father is the permanent ruler. Make the
marital relationship genuinely political, and you have the possibility of
genuine friendship.

I had a friend and colleague who
was from Nigeria. He once told me that
he thought it was acceptable for a man to slap his wife as a way of settling a
marital dispute. I disagreed
vehemently. I think that this is just as
excuse for abuse. I could not persuade
my friend of this. Aristotle was not
always right. I still think he was ahead
of my friend.

ps. The argument for gender equality in Plato comes from the Republic. In Socrates' "best regime" the men and women in the warrior class will be raised and trained the same. Socrates' interlocutors regarded this suggestion as if he had proposed that we all put on wings and fly about. The Greek view of women was not progressive. This may be the reason that sex in Plato is almost always about sexy men.